Don Kos Orders Hit On TNR For Breaking Code of Kosmerta

Good stuff:

There was one big rule for this ["Townhouse" mailing/discussion group], an important cog in the growing Vast Left Wing Conspiracy -- everything discussed was off the record.

That was obviously violated today as the New Republic betrayed, once again, that it seeks to destroy the new people-powered movement for the sake of its Lieberman-worshipping neocon owners; that it stands with the National Review and wingnutoshpere in their opposition to grassroots Democrats.

The magazine published, in its website, an email I sent to the list. There is nothing controversial about the email, but Jason Zengerle tried to spin it as evidence that there is a "smoke-filled room" and that I send "dictats" to other bloggers, controlling what they can and cannot write about. In a subsequent post, Zengerle went further, saying that I control the financial fates of much of the progressive blogosphere. My power apparently knows no bounds!

Ludicrous, all of it, but that's the new rules of the game. TNR and its enablers are feeling the heat of their own irrelevance and this is how they fight it -- by undermining the progressive movement. Zengerle has made common cause with the wingnutosphere, using the laughable "kosola" frame they created and emailing his "scoops" to them for links. This is what the once-proud New Republic has evolved into -- just another cog of the Vast RIGHT Wing Conspiracy.

If you still hold a subscription to that magazine, it really is time to call it quits. If you see it in a magazine rack, you might as well move it behind the National Review or even NewsMax, since that's who they want to be associated with these days.

But what about the merits? There are none, as frequent critics of this site like Ezra Klein and Max Sawicky have already stated. In fact, it's quite funny how they're trying to parlay the nothing they have into something, anything at all. It's the price of success, and we knew the knives would be coming out after Vegas, so we shouldn't be surprised.

But I do admit being surprised by the sheer creativity of their invented attacks, such as my supposed "pay for play" scheme. Let me be crystal clear. I deny that charge completely. I have stated the sources of my income and they do not include money from people asking me to shill for anyone or anything. Problem for these writers, is that the law doesn't protect such defamation. The truth is an absolute defense to libel cases. If they have evidence for those smears, then they have nothing to fear. But if they, say, recklessly invented all manners of illegal or unethical activities by me without bothering to see if they bore any basis in truth, then they'll have plenty to worry about.

LGF has a great point. Kos is basically alleging the MSM is all in cahoots together -- TNR teaming up with NRO! -- to keep Kos down.

The irony is that there is indeed a secret organization, scheming to present a united front and keep all the stories straight and all the messages pure. And Kos admits in the first paragraph above that he’s part of it.

Good run-down at Hot Air, with a funny photoshop.

Protein Wisdom observes:

You can’t be on the left and disagree with Kos. Or rather, you can’t be on the left and disagree with Kos publicly — which suggests that the defining characteristic of progressivism is fidelity to its officially-sanctioned narratives.

Over at Instapundit, liberal blogger Pandagon is quoted as saying he's crossed Don Kos and suffered no consequences. Well, okay; that's good to know. Certainly though Kos is looking for payback against TNR though, huh? One can forgive a liberal blogger for erring on the side of caution and avoiding the story entirely.

This whole "Townhouse" deal-- it's soooooo... liberal. So groupthink. As far as I know, there's nothing at all like that on the right. And if someone asked me to join something like that, I'd think they were a little soft.

Liberals are joiners.

posted by Ace at 01:19 PM

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